Paula Simons: Restoring the Queen Elizabeth II Planetarium, the jewel in the crown of Coronation Park

It’s back to the future for Edmonton’s long-deserted Queen Elizabeth II Planetarium.

The city and the Telus World of Science-Edmonton have come to an agreement to renovate and restore the beautiful old planetarium as a teaching, reception and production space. The deal will take one of Edmonton’s truly landmark buildings out of stasis and give it a new mission.

“It was the right thing for us to do, to work with the city to bring the QEP back to life,” says Alan Nursall, president and CEO of the Telus World of Science. “It’s our heritage. It’s our legacy. It’s where we came from. We want to preserve it as an icon of Edmonton history.”

The city has commissioned Architecture|Tkalcic Bengert to come up with designs to restore the building to its 1960 glory, complete with updates to make it accessible for people in wheelchairs and others with mobility impairments. The city also plans, at long last, to grant the building heritage designation and protection.

“We’re more than halfway through the design process,” says Trish Kuffler, the city’s program manager for facility design and construction.

The city plans to put the construction contract out to tender in the first quarter of 2017. The hope is to start construction this spring and for the Telus World of Science to take possession in time for the 2018 summer camp season.

The project will have a budget of about $6.6 million.

It’s a sensible plan for one of Edmonton’s most quirky and beautiful works of public architecture, and for Canada’s first public planetarium.

The dramatic round glass and gold building, with its signature silver-domed roof and transparent glass walls, was designed by the official City of Edmonton architects, R.F. Duke and W. Tefler, to look like a flying saucer hovering above the ground on a raised pedestal.

Outside, the building was finished with fieldstone and gold anodized aluminum. Inside, there were terrazzo floors, red marble walls, doors padded with red leather, and elegant multicoloured hardwood.

It’s a charming jewel of a little building. The madness is that we’ve left it virtually abandoned for years.

Over the last decade, the city has struggled to find commercial tenants for the site, preferably those who might have money of their own for renovations. But given the building was designed as a science education centre and observatory, twinning it with the Telus World of Science just makes sense.

“People love that building. I have a deep affection for it, too. I was a kid there in the ’60s, going to see star shows there. It’s a magical spot,” says Nursall.

The original star projector equipment is long gone. But the concrete planetarium dome is still intact. Nursall plans to equip it with hand-me-down digital projectors from the main science centre. But mostly he wants to use the small planetarium theatre as a production studio, where people can work on new shows for the big star theatre next door.

Nursall also wants to use the facility, a short walk from the main building, for summer camps and various classes — programs so popular, the existing science centre can’t keep up.

The theatre and lobby, with its walls of floor-to-ceiling windows and views of Coronation Park, would be available for rent by community groups or conference organizers or star-struck bridal parties, though Nursall cautions there’s probably only room for 6o or 70 guests.

There’s no formal lease agreement yet. But since the science centre already leases its main building from the city, Nursall says it should be pretty easy to add the planetarium to the mix. The city probably won’t make much money on the deal — but it will get a tenant who will animate the building, care for it and make it useful again. (Oh, and there will be accessible public washrooms for picnickers at the back of the building, too.)

It’s a fine plan. The frustration is that we had to wait this long to make it so. Still, it’s a joy and a relief to see this iconic building, built with public funds to serve all Edmontonians, safe at last.

Just down the road, another stunning modernist public building, the old Royal Alberta Museum, is under threat, with the cash-strapped province pondering demolition rather than pricey repairs.

May the planetarium serve as a cautionary tale and model. Better to place a building dormant until you have the money and will to restore it than to recklessly tear it down. It would be even better, of course, if responsible public guardians came up with proper plans for magnificent heritage buildings before, not after, they replaced them.

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